History

The history of SideBySide can be traced back to 1955. At that time, the Sheng Kung Hui Sheng Carpenter's Church recruited more than a hundred discharged prisoners to assist in the construction of the Hung Hom Holy Carpenter's Church, which began the earliest rehabilitation work for the discharged prisoners. The group of discharged prisoners lost their livelihoods after the completion of the project. Therefore, Pastor Au placed them in the young workers' home in the church. Two years later, Pastor Au and a group of part-time volunteer workers established The Hong Kong Discharged Prisoners' Aid Society. It was renamed as The Society for the Rehabilitation of Offenders, Hong Kong in 1982 and the Society of Rehabilitation and Crime Prevention, Hong Kong in 2001. SideBySide is named after the Rebranding Project in 2023.

In the early days of its establishment, SideBySide adopted a comprehensive service model. In addition to providing case counselling, it also has a recreation centre, a craft training centre, and dormitories to fully cater for the needs of service users in all aspects. SideBySide still adheres to the same philosophy to continuously seek for improvement in our existing services and actively develop more related services for rehabilitated people.

"Food, clothing, shelter, and transportation" are the basic needs of life, and accommodation is the top priority for rehabilitated persons after they are discharged from prison. The establishment of hostels can give rehabilitated people shelter and solve their immediate needs in life. Therefore, it is one of the earliest projects developed by SideBySide. There were three hostels opened in 1959. In recent years, SideBySide has provided Short-term Rental Assistance to alleviate the shortage of hostel beds.

Recreation activities are good for the body and mind, it also cultivates healthy interests and help rehabilitated people to get rid of bad habits. SideBySide established recreation centres in Tung Tau and Wan Chai in 1964 and 1966 respectively. The former moved to Chuk Yuen South Estate in 1988, and as of May 2019, recreation services have been integrated into Integrated Service Centre for Social Rehabilitation & Community Support Centres.

The development of services should meet environmental changes and social needs. In the 1960s and 1970s, many service users had drug abuse problems. In early 1965, SideBySide established a Rotary Drug Rehabilitation Centre to carry out a three-year drug rehabilitation trial programme. Today, our services have become more professional. Since 1998, SideBySide launched an integrated and collaborative project by the Society and Substance Abuse Assessment Unit (SAAU) of Kwai Chung Hospital, which is now called the Hong Kong Jockey Club Community Project Grant: Project Oasis.

To assist rehabilitated persons to improve effectively, it is very important to intervene as soon as possible and provide appropriate counselling. In the 1960s, SideBySide visited various prisons and correctional institutions regularly to meet inmates in need. In order to establish a relationship of mutual trust with them, we often cooperated with the Hong Kong Correctional Services Department to organise festive celebrations and friendly matches. Later, we further strengthened the work of pre-release counselling. In addition to introducing services, we will also work with inmates to formulate their post-release rehabilitation plan to ensure that they are properly followed up.

The most difficult part of rehabilitation work is gaining public recognition. The support and acceptance of the public are of great help to the rehabilitation process. In order to break the gap between the public and rehabilitated persons, we established the Community Education Service in 1977. We employ rehabilitated persons who have recovered to speak out and share their experiences. It helps to promote crime prevention education and also deepens public awareness of rehabilitated people.

In 2005, we established the Hong Kong Jockey Club TeenGuard Valley - Crime Prevention Education Centre to provide an interactive educational day camp for youths, parents and educators.  

Established in 1977, the Yuen Long Hostel is our first hostel for rehabilitated persons with mental illness. It was converted into a halfway house in 1985.

• Renamed as 「善導會」in Chinese
• Renamed as "The Society for the Rehabilitation of Offenders, Hong Kong"
• Granted by government resources, Yuen Long Hostel has converted into a halfway house to provide services for male ex-offenders in mental recovery
• Launched a two-year trial programme for offender counselling
• Set up the flower garden
• The Tung Tau Counselling Office, also the Recreation Centre and Craft Training Centre have moved to Chuk Yuen South Estate
• Established “Friends of SRACP” 善導知友

In the past ten years, mental health services have developed rapidly. In addition to the original hostel services and clinical psychological services, two Integrated Community Centres for Mental Wellness have been established to provide all-rounded community support.

In order to provide on-the-job training and transitional jobs to service users with lower knowledge and skills, we established a social enterprise-"Bright Services Co., Ltd." in 1997. At the beginning of its establishment, it mainly focused on handling and delivery services. The business has now expanded to exhibition services, cleaning services and food production.

Rehabilitated persons encounter employment difficulties from time to time. At the earliest stage, we set up a craft training centre to provide transitional work arrangements for rehabilitated persons who could not find a job in the open market. However, the nature of the work is mostly non-technical and does not help much to improve their professional skills.

Therefore, we opened skills training courses in the 1970s and launched Employment Development Service in 1999 to provide larger-scale vocational training and job matching to improve the competitiveness of rehabilitated persons.

• Renamed as "The Society of Rehabilitation and Crime Prevention, Hong Kong" in English
• Renamed as "香港善導會" in Chinese
• Sponsored by the Prisoners' Welfare Fund of the Correctional Services Department to set up a “Hotline Service for Discharged Prisoners” answered by registered social workers
• Established two community mental health networks to establish a support network for persons in recovery and their families living in Tuen Mun and the Eastern District of Hong Kong Island
• Granted by the Hong Kong Jockey Club Charities Trust Fund, Jockey Club Home Circuit Service Center was established to provide services to the families of rehabilitated persons

We established the Mercury III Health Education Center in 2005 to provide services to communities prone to AIDS. Later, we saw that many people of South Asian ethnicity in society had drug abuse problems, and we gradually launched drug education programs targeting South Asian ethnicities.

As an easier way to integrate into the community, we encourage rehabilitated persons to actively participate in voluntary work and contribute to society. In addition, we recruit community volunteers who are interested in rehabilitation work to support our services.

• In 2007, we launched the Mock Trial - Justice Education Project. The process of mock cases and "lawsuits"  let students understand Hong Kong's judicial procedures and strengthen their judgment ability, and enhance crime prevention awareness
• Provide community mental health collaboration services, named "盈康動力", respectively in Yuen Long, Kowloon City and Yau Tsim Mong districts to provide outreach services to potential mental patients in the district
• Cooperate with the Correctional Services Department to organise pre-release employment training courses for inmates and launch a "LEAP Project" to provide inmates with drug abuse backgrounds with preventive relapse education and counselling services
• Implement the Mars Project to train recovered Nepalese people and provide peer education for drug abusers of the same ethnically diverse group
• Established the "利希慎緊急援助基金 Lee Hysan Emergency Foundation" to assist rehabilitated persons and their families in short-term emergency financial needs
• Subsidised by the Social Welfare Department to provide short-term rental allowances to newly discharged prisoners and increase employment placement groups to relieve the shortage of beds in the hostels and provide more employment services to rehabilitated persons
• Received funding from the Home Affairs Department's "伙伴倡自強 Partners for Self-reliance" Community Collaboration Project to develop exhibition business and provide job opportunities for rehabilitated persons
• Sponsored by the Beat Drugs Fund Association, the "抗毒兵團小學生抗毒教育計劃 Anti-Drug Education Program for Primary School Students" was launched in primary schools in the New Territories to instil anti-drug awareness and skills to stay away from drugs

Starting from October 1, 2010, “Integrated Community Centres for Mental Wellness” have been set up in 18 districts in Hong Kong to integrate existing community support services, including community mental health collaboration programmes, halfway house renewal services, and day community rehabilitation Services, training and activity centres for persons in recovery. We established centres in Kowloon City District (Vitality Place) and Yuen Long District (Placidity Place) respectively, for persons in recovery, people with suspected mental health problems, their family members/caregivers and residents in the local area. Provide one-stop, district-based and accessible community mental health support service from early prevention to risk management and rehabilitation service.

The newly added "Project PEER" on Mercury III provides outreach health education and voluntary blood test counselling service for non-Chinese people, and advocates education on the prevention of AIDS and blood-borne diseases (STDs and viral hepatitis). The service targets include drug abusers, female sex workers and their clients, and youth at-risk.

• Set up the Corporate Communications Division (CCD) and strengthen the Division of Professional and Quality Management functions (PDQM)
• "Home Circuit Service Center" officially became the seventh social service centre and was renamed "Home Circuit Service Centre"

• Established the Occupational therapy service

We actively develop an integrated service model, merging the recreation centre and social service centre into an Integrated Service Centre for Social Rehabilitation & Community Support Centre(ISC), and provide service users with one-stop and suitable support through integrated services. After various preparations and regional consultations, we officially established four ISC (a total of seven service locations) in Hong Kong in May of the following year. Under the new service model, we emphasise cooperation with the community and providing services to the families of rehabilitated persons.

Supported by the sponsorship of The Hong Kong Jockey Club Charities Trust, SideBySide and The Boys' & Girls' Clubs Association of Hong Kong (BGCA) launched the Blue Bus Jockey Club Together We Grow Project (BBJC) together in March 2019 to provide the all-rounded supporting service towards the children and youth, whose parents are arrested, incarcerated or ex-offenders, also their caregivers in Hong Kong, in order to resolve or overcome the challenges from family and development stages, also facilitate the positive family relationship.

Committee members group photo